Bank holidays and annual leave

rocketqueen

Just wanted some advice about bank holidays:

I work in a care home but not as a care assistant, I have always had 28 days holiday and as I am not needed to work bank holidays I have taken these days off unpaid allowing me to book the other 28 days annual leave when I would like them.

I was asked to book my annual leave for the year as soon as possible so booked all of it up at the beginning of January and it was signed as agreed.

Now I have been told that I have to use 8 days of my annual leave for the bank holidays from now on so need to cancel a week and a half of my booked holidays.

I realise that employers can tell you when to take your holidays but can they change the rules after insisting you book your holidays? My contract doesn't say anything specific relating to bank holidays and my employee handbook says check your contract!

I have been with this company for nearly 10 years and in current role for 4. The 2 people previous to me in my role also took bank holidays as unpaid and had the full holiday allowance (covers a period of over 10 years.)

Just seems so unfair that after booking my holidays as instructed I will now have to cancel 1 entirely and amend another potentially losing money on the bookings.

nicechap

Why not suggest taking the 8 days annual leave you have to move to Bank Holidays as unpaid leave? Over the entire year that's the same as your current arrnagement.

sangie595

rocketqueen wrote: »

Just wanted some advice about bank holidays:

I work in a care home but not as a care assistant, I have always had 28 days holiday and as I am not needed to work bank holidays I have taken these days off unpaid allowing me to book the other 28 days annual leave when I would like them.

I was asked to book my annual leave for the year as soon as possible so booked all of it up at the beginning of January and it was signed as agreed.

Now I have been told that I have to use 8 days of my annual leave for the bank holidays from now on so need to cancel a week and a half of my booked holidays.

I realise that employers can tell you when to take your holidays but can they change the rules after insisting you book your holidays? My contract doesn't say anything specific relating to bank holidays and my employee handbook says check your contract!

I have been with this company for nearly 10 years and in current role for 4. The 2 people previous to me in my role also took bank holidays as unpaid and had the full holiday allowance (covers a period of over 10 years.)

Just seems so unfair that after booking my holidays as instructed I will now have to cancel 1 entirely and amend another potentially losing money on the bookings.

I may be reading this incorrectly, but..... Assuming that you are full-time time and paid an annual salary (so not on an hourly pay rate), I think your employer has just noticed that you have all been getting an extra 8 days holiday a year, and has put a stop to it!

If you are on a salary then you can't do what you have all been doing. A week consists of seven days, which includes some rest periods (time off between shifts and days off). That is true of every week, whether or not it has a public holiday. So unless you have had a days pay deducted during the weeks that have bank holidays in them, then you haven't actually been having those days off unpaid. You have just been having days off.

If I am correct in this, then technically you have all been taking too many holidays and it is possible that the employer could take some of them back - in the form of money! You would have been overpaid. So you might not be well advised to start arguing with it.

You have actually made financial commitments that are totally unable to be amended for every holiday period this year already, despite the fact that you only booked these dates a week or so ago? And you are uninsured for those losses? It's surprising that any holiday company won't allow cancellation at an early stage with a full refund. I just booked my trip to Cuba last week, and since its in October, I have the right to cancel will a full refund until March, and even after that I can change my dates with full credit, or get most of my money refunded for even longer. And I'm insured for losses like this. Anything can happen several months from now... lots of things can get in the way of one's plans.

hyubh

sangie595 wrote: »

If I am correct in this, then technically you have all been taking too many holidays and it is possible that the employer could take some of them back - in the form of money! You would have been overpaid. So you might not be well advised to start arguing with it.

Maybe, however if it's configured correctly, I would expect the payroll system to deal with absences coded as 'unpaid leave' correctly. (And if the 'system' is a manual one, then I'd expect the human to do it correctly.)

rocketqueen - if you still have them, what did your payslips covering bank holidays you were off say? As sangie says, if they were interpreted correctly, we would expect a deduction showing.

molerat

If the system is configured correctly and the unpaid days are logged correctly then no problem with pay. Although you may not be needed on a BH those extra 8 normal working days you are taking as holiday may have to be covered by someone else. If you are light staffed that then creates a problem.

sangie595

molerat wrote: »

If the system is configured correctly and the unpaid days are logged correctly then no problem with pay. Although you may not be needed on a BH those extra 8 normal working days you are taking as holiday may have to be covered by someone else. If you are light staffed that then creates a problem.

That is assuming that they were logged at all. Unless the OP specifically requested unpaid leave for certain days, then they won't have been logged anywhere. Given that they are public holidays, it could have been unnoticed until the empoyees were asked to book an entire years leave at once; and only when management saw the whole year pattern did it get noticed. Systems only work based on what humans tell them, and humans can make mistakes. In fact, the request for a years bookings now could have caused the employer to go back to previous years and check them - it's pretty uncommon that someone never had paid leave on a bank holiday (for example, Christmas and boxing day one would not expect someone to volunteer not to be paid for!).

rocketqueen

Thank you all for your input.

To clarify:

I have never been paid for any of the bank holidays in this role over the 4 years I have been doing it nor did the staff in the role before me (Before this i was in a role that did require me to work them so I of course I got paid.)

No one covers me during the bank holidays as my employer does not require any one to do my role over the bank holidays and will not let me work them.

I have booked all of my holidays at senior management's request already and yes have booked hotels etc for them (all in uk and through sites such as booking.com so have paid upfront.)

I am paid an hourly rate (not salaried) so my payslip just reflects that I was paid less hours.

Payroll Is processed by computer system and It just shows I have not worked the bank holidays, as they have been taken as unpaid, management and payroll have been aware that this is the case and has been the norm for over 10 years (before I had the role.)

anamenottaken

When I worked with people who were on full-time contracts but took unpaid holiday plus their full entitlement to paid leave (that is all the days that a full-time employee had), I felt cheated - that they were getting more paid holiday for the amount of time they worked.

For instance in the OP's case, they would receive 28 days (5.6 weeks) paid leave (the same as me) but I would have to work 46.4 weeks to earn that but they would work only 44.8 weeks.

I expect you will tell me that I received that to which I was entitled under the contract I accepted and that life isn't fair - but it still is annoying.

nicechap

anamenottaken wrote: »

When I worked with people who were on full-time contracts but took unpaid holiday plus their full entitlement to paid leave (that is all the days that a full-time employee had), I felt cheated - that they were getting more paid holiday for the amount of time they worked.

For instance in the OP's case, they would receive 28 days (5.6 weeks) paid leave (the same as me) but I would have to work 46.4 weeks to earn that but they would work only 44.8 weeks.

I expect you will tell me that I received that to which I was entitled under the contract I accepted and that life isn't fair - but it still is annoying.

In this other thread you will see some organisations take more than a day's pay when you have an unpaid day to take into account holiday pay accrued.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5783346

nicechap

anamenottaken wrote: »

When I worked with people who were on full-time contracts but took unpaid holiday plus their full entitlement to paid leave (that is all the days that a full-time employee had), I felt cheated - that they were getting more paid holiday for the amount of time they worked.

For instance in the OP's case, they would receive 28 days (5.6 weeks) paid leave (the same as me) but I would have to work 46.4 weeks to earn that but they would work only 44.8 weeks.

I expect you will tell me that I received that to which I was entitled under the contract I accepted and that life isn't fair - but it still is annoying.

So why not suggest you take the 8 days as unpaid holiday and leave yourself in the exact same position as before.

Does your manager know they will now be paying you 8 extra days pay?

jobbingmusician

nicechap wrote: »

So why not suggest you take the 8 days as unpaid holiday and leave yourself in the exact same position as before.

Does your manager know they will now be paying you 8 extra days pay?

Well, in the situation I discussed in the other thread, the OP wouldn't necessarily be in the same position as before.

Let's exaggerate. If the OP took 3 months' unpaid leave, would they have earned a full year's paid holiday entitlement? Clearly not, as they have only worked 9 months, so should only be entitled to 3/4 of the paid holiday. Sounds as if this company is clamping down on people taking unpaid days (as, of course, they are fully entitled to do) - probably for exactly the same reason.